Finance Minister Claims Venezuela will soon pay back “external debt”

In a rather generous move, Russia has agreed to restructure the large debt owed to it by Venezuela. The debt, which works up to almost $3.15bn will be difficult for the struggling country to repay.

The new restructuring offered by Russia means that Venezuela can now make only “minimal” repayments on the money owed. It will also be allowed up to six years to repay the amount. The deal is bound to come as a huge relief to Venezuela which has been suffering through a financial crisis of sorts.

The amendment comes just one day after a number of credit ratings agencies raised alarms over the fact that Venezuela had missed its recent payments. The country currently owes almost $140bn to a myriad of foreign creditors.

Venezuela’s government hosted a meeting in Caracas earlier this week to discuss the possibility of restructuring the payment methods. However, creditors who attended the meeting informed journalists that there were no concrete actions taken.

The Venezuelan government on the other hand believes it has taken a number of important decisions. Officials informed the press that the government had already begun the transfer of $200m in interest payments and that it would continue to meet all of its obligations in the same way. The Finance Minister of the country stated that Venezuela was “moving forward” and would soon pay off all of its “external debt”.

The Russian Finance Ministry issued a statement on Wednesday saying it would allow Venezuela to release funds for economic development and would also improve the country’s chances of repaying all of its creditors.

Patricia Kellogg is a journalist who has held many editorial roles at numerous high-profile publishers – both offline as well as online. She has an experience of more than 10 years in editing and proofreading articles across a range of sectors. She is also well versed with handling academic journal articles, theses, technical manuals, press releases, reports, feature articles, web site content, promotional material, policy papers, and grant proposals.